ARTICLES ABOUT MAINSTREAM BY DATE - PAGE 5

BAKU/TBILISI (Reuters) - When a businessman in Muslim-majority Azerbaijan wanted a bank loan that complied with Islamic principles, until a few years ago he had to negotiate it under the table. The government's fear of political Islam forced banks to conduct "guerrilla Islamic finance" in which sharia-compliant deals were hidden under the appearance of conventional banking, says Fuad Aliyev, a scholar at Johns Hopkins University's Central Asia-Caucasus Institute in Washington DC. Now several banks in Azerbaijan openly offer a limited range of services based on Islamic principles including bans on interest and pure monetary speculation.

SAN SEBASTIAN Catalan auteur Isaki Lacuesta, winner of San Sebastian's Golden Shell last year with "The Double Steps," is going mainstream with black comedy"Murieron por encima de sus posibilidades." "?'Murieron' is a satire of Spain today, with doses of tragicomedy and dark comedy, in the vein of Luis Garcia Berlanga and John Waters" Lacuesta said. Pic narrates the story of five Spanish people whose lives have been shattered by the economic crisis. Carted off to a psychiatric ward , they plan to save the worldwide economy by kidnapping and torturing a banker.

Fred Eaglesmith pulls up to some small club, 200 or 300 nights a year, in some city in his school bus that runs on vegetable oil. Like Willie Nelson's bus, it smells like french fries, but only if it has good grease. If it has bad grease, Eaglesmith says, "It smells like bad french fries. " Eaglesmith is the driver, for hundreds of miles at a stretch, as well as the primary mechanic and the singer, songwriter, guitarist and bandleader. The only way most people have ever heard of Eaglesmith, if at all, is through songs so brilliant that Nashville stars haven't been able to stay away from them.

* Private banking assets almost double in five years * Wealthy investors may be more patient than less affluent By Jessica Toonkel NEW YORK, Aug 28 (Reuters) - Capital Group Companies has been luring wealthy private clients over the past few years with its long-term investment strategies as mainstream investors le ft the Los Angeles-based giant's Am erican Funds in search of higher, more immediate returns. Since 2008, Capital Group Private Client Services has seen its assets almost double t o $20 billion f rom $11.5 billion in a sign the firm's conservative investment approach is attractive to the wealthiest of U.S. investors.

The talent of Skokie teenager Edon Pinchot as he sings and plays the piano often blow audiences away. His most ardent fans are giddy with excitement as the 14-year-old prepares to perform in the semi-finals of the nationally televised NBC network program, "America's Got Talent. " "He's very young and has insane singing ability," said Sarah Shandalov, the 17-year-old Chicago girl who got the ball rolling for Pinchot two years ago, when she posted a video of him performing on YouTube.

By Pedro Nicolaci da Costa WASHINGTON, Aug 19 (Reuters) - Paul Ryan doesn't quite want to end the Fed. But if Mitt Romney's pick for vice president had his way, he might curb the central bank's powers enough to make it harder for policymakers to respond aggressively to economic downturns. The Wisconsin Republican has supported controversial legislation that would strip the U.S. Federal Reserve of its mission to seek maximum employment, and has been a harsh critic of the central bank's continued loose monetary policy.

LAS VEGAS (Reuters) - When Jeff Moss founded the Def Con hackers convention in 1993, he never imagined that two decades on, one of the key speakers at the annual Las Vegas event would be four-star General Keith Alexander, head of the U.S. National Security Agency. Once known as an excuse for computer geeks and social misfits to drink cheap beer, create mischief and party all night Sin City-style, Def Con has transformed itself into a venue where elite and amateur hackers alike debate serious security issues with experts from the public and private sectors.

Moms aren't the only ones riding high on "Fifty Shades of Grey. " Sex toy sales are surging as more couples add handcuffs and riding crops to their repertoire. At San Francisco-based Good Vibrations, sales of bondage sex toys have increased 65 percent and erotica 50 percent since "Fifty Shades" rose to the top of the best-seller lists this spring with its graphic tale of an ingenue submitting to the sexual games of a powerful man, introducing mainstream audiences to themes of BDSM (an acronym encompassing bondage and discipline, domination and submission and sadism and masochism)